The
territory of the Republic of Moldova before 1991 never formed a unique and
distinct political entity as it does today. Its history is perhaps one of the
most complicated components of European history and, because of the
inter-relationship with the history of other territories populated by
Romanians, this history can only be described in an entirely separate context,
except for the period after the Second World War.

Ancient times. Creation of Romanians

Born
like the other Romance speaking peoples in the 1st millennium AD,
the ancestors of those who are now known as Romanians have continuously
inhabited the geographical space encompassing the territories stretching from
the Pannonian Plain in the west to Transnistria (Transdnestr) in the east, from
the Black Sea and Danube in the south to the Trans Carpathian area and Galicia
in the north. Their forefathers, the Thracian tribes, had populated a larger
area as early as the 2nd millennium BC. The Greeks called them
Getae, the Romans called them Dacians, but they were actually a single
Geto-Dacian people. The important historical references about them came mostly
from Greek, Byzantine and Italian sources. From the 7th century
B.C., the Greeks and then the Byzantines and Italians established their own
ports and trading colonies along the northwestern shore of the Black Sea
(Pontus Euxinus) and on the Danube, and continued to trade with the local
people.

Burebista
(82 – around 44 BC) succeeded in uniting the Geto-Dacian tribes for the first
time.When the Dacian sovereign offered
to support Pompey against Caesar (48 BC), he founded a powerful kingdom
stretchingfrom the Beskids (north) to
the Middle Danube (west), to the Tyras River (Nistru), to the Black Sea shore
(east) and to the Balkan Mountains (south).

In
the 1st century BC, as the Roman empire was expanding and Roman
provinces were being created in Pannonia, Dalmatia, Moesia and Thracia, the
Danube became the border between the Roman Empire and the Dacian world along
1,500 Km. In Dobrogea on the Northeastern shore of the Black Sea, which was
under Roman rule for seven centuries beginning with the reign of Augustus, poet
Publius Ovidius Naso was exiled to Tomis (8-17 AD) by order of the same Caesar,
and he spent the last years of his life “among Greeks and Getae.”

Dacia
was at the peak of its power under King Decebal (87-106 AD). After a first
confrontation during the reign of Domitian (87-89), two extremely tough wars
were necessary (101-102 and 105-106) for the Roman Empire, also at the peak of
it’s power under Emperor Trajan (98-117), in order to defeat Decebal and turn
most of his kingdom into the Roman province called Dacia. The 165 years of
Roman domination over the Transylvanian Basin, and the plain to the south along
the Danube and Black Sea, had an enormous impact on the destiny ofthe Dacians to be freed from the Roman
Empire, as well as on the already free Dacians. The Romans recorded their
expansion north of the Danube on two famous monuments: one is Trajani’s Column
in Rome, the work of Apollodorus of Damascus (113 AD), and the other is the
Triumphal Monument on the site of their victory at Adamclisi in Dobrogea (109
AD). The defensive earthen walls (Roman vallum or bulwark) built by them in the
southern part of the Prut and Nistru interfluves, traced from the banks of the
Danube to the neighbourhood of Tighina (Bender), can now be admired and
represent priceless historical natural deeds of Roman affiliation of these
areas.

The
slave-owning Romans brought with them a superior civilization and, when mixed
with the conquered tribes, contributed to the formation of a new people
speaking a tongue similar to Latin. These Romanised natives, be they of Roman
or Daco-Roman descent, continued their uninterrupted existence as farmers,
shepherds and hunters, even after the withdrawal of the Roman army and
administration under Emperor Aurelian (270-275),which moved south of the Danube as a result
of the Goth attacks. But the ancestors of the Romanians remained for several
centuries in the political, economic, religious and cultural sphere of
influence of the Roman Empire.After the
empire split in 395 AD, they stayed in the sphere of the Byzantine Empire,
which was later transformed into the Eastern Roman Empire.

The
Daco-Roman ethno-cultural symbiosis was achieved and finalised in the 8th
and 9th centuries by the formation of the Romanian people. It should
be noted that Romanians emerged in history as Christians, since Christianity in
a Latin garb was adopted by the Daco-Romans earlier during the 2nd –
4thcenturies. This is why,
unlike the neighbouring nations which have established dates of
Christianisation (the Bulgarians 864, the Serbs 874, the Poles 966, the eastern
Slavs 988, the Hungarians 1000), the Romanians do not have a fixed date of
Christianisation, as they were the first Christian nation in the region.

In
the 4th – 13th centuries, the predecessors of the
Romanians had to face waves of migrating peoples – the Goths, Huns, Slavs,
Gepidae, Avars, Bolgars, Petchenegs, Hungarians, Cumans and Tartars – who
crossed the territories of the Romanians. The migratory tribes controlled this
space, from the military and political points of view, delaying the economic
and social development of the natives and the formation of local statehood
entities. The Romanised Dacians, actually the early Romanians still under the
influence of the vanishing Roman Empire, survived in the mountainous and
heavily forested regions of the country (named by their neighbours Valachs).

The
Slavs, who since the 7th century massively settled south of the
Danube, split the compact mass of Romanised population in the
Carpathian-Danubian area: the ones to the north (the Daco-Romanians) were
separated from the ones to the south, (Aromanians, Megleno-Romanians and
Istro-Romanians) who were moved towards the west and southeast of the Balkan
Peninsula The Slavs who settled north of the Danube were assimilated little by
little by the Romanian people and their language had traces in their vocabulary
and phonetics of the Romanian language. To the Romanian language, the Slavic
language (similar to the Germanic idiom of the Franks with the French people)
was the so-called super-imposed layer.

Owing
to their position, the Romanised natives south of the Danube were the first to
be mentioned in historical sources (the 10th century), under the
name of vlahi or blahi (Wallachians). This name came from Latin official
documents, where they were called Vlachs, from which the Hungarian name Olah
and the German name Wallach were derived. It clearly shows they were speakers
of a Romance language and the non-Roman people around them recognised this
fact. In 681, after the Slavs massively settled south of the Danube, a powerful
Bulgarian czardom was established; thus the tie was cut between the Romanised
world north of the Danube and the one south of the Danube. As they were
subjected to all sorts of pressures and isolated from both the powerful
Romanian trunk north of the Danube and Rome itself, the number of Romanised
natives south of the Danube continuously decreased.Their brothers north of the Danube, although
living in extremely difficult circumstances, continued their historical
evolution as a separate nation, the farthest one to the east among the
descendants of Imperial Rome.

However,
the Romanised population from the south of the Danube continued to play an
important political and military role in southeastern Europe, especially after
the collapse of the Bulgarian czardom. Thus, between 1185-1258, they succeeded
in maintaining a powerful Romanian-Bulgarian kingdom with the capital in
Tarnovo which covered Bulgaria north of the Balkan Mountains. An extremely
interesting episode in the history of this kingdom is its short-time union with
the Roman Catholic Church, established by the King Ioniţă (Kaloyan) and Pope
Innocent III in 1204.

By
the late 9th century, the Vlachs (i.e., ethnic Romanians) north of
the Danube appear to have accepted a Slavonic liturgy and Bulgarian
ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The acceptance of the Slavonic liturgy, and circulation
of the Slavic (not Russian!) language on the territories of Romanians, had a
political explanation. The permanent and difficult controversies between Rome
and Constantinople, and the dispute over the territories north of the Danube,
increased after the Bulgarians (865) and Serbs (874) adopted Christianity,
choosing allegiance to the Church of Byzantium. Remaining isolated from Rome
and the Vatican by these two emerging Christianised nations, the Christian
Romanised population from north of the Danube had to accept the authority of a
nearest autocephaly seat settled by Constantinople on the territory of
Bulgarian czardom (initially at Ohrida, and then at Tarnovo).Since the Bulgarian territory was used by
Romanians to access the most attractive markets ofthat time, the Latin gradually lost his
influence in the area.

The
Christianisation of the Poles (966) and the Hungarians (1000) under Catholic
Rome, which strengthened Rome’s influence and Latin’s usage in the region,
didn’t strengthen the ties between Romanians and their neighbours. This was due
to the fact that Hungarians, and less the Poles, continued their expansionist
military actions against Romanians. These relations continued to deteriorate
after the schism between the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Byzantium
(1054).

These
factors explain in large part why Orthodoxy extended its influence and
authority over the territories of Romanians and why the first ecclesiastical
metropolitan seats for the Romanian provinces were not created until the 14th
century. The Slavonic Church remained the liturgical language until the 17th
century, when Romanian began to replace it. But, although the Slavic language
was even a chancery and cultured language beginning with the 14th – 16th
centuries, it was never a living language spoken by the people in the Romanian
territories. At a certain time during the Middle Ages, it played a role for the
Romanians similar to that played by Latin in the West; in the early modern age
it was replaced forever in church, chancery and culture by the Romanian
language.

So,
at the end of the 10th century the Romanians were and are until now
the sole descendants of that Eastern Roman world, and their language
(Romanian), along with Spanish, French and Italian, is one of the major
descendants of Latin. Moreover, the Romanians are the only ones who, through
their very name – Roman (coming from the Latin word “Roman”) – have preserved
to this day in this part of Europe the seal of the ancestors, so that they have
always been aware of their descent. This will show later in the name of the
nation state – Romania.

Middle Ages. Principality of Moldova

When the great migrations
ended, the Romanians began to descend from the forested piedmonts, hills and
Carpathian mountains and gradually moved toward the lower southern and eastern
lands once inhabited by their ancestors. The attraction of the new uninhabited
lands, and the demographic pressure of the overcrowded lands “at home”,
motivated the move. This slow natural movement took several centuries. In their
eastward drive, the Romanians reoccupied the whole region between the eastern
Carpathian range and the surrounding hills to the Nistru River, and crossed
Nistru en masse as well as in scattered groups.

Beginning with the 10th
century, documents of Slavic, Byzantine, Hungarian and Latin sources bear
witness to the existence of state formations throughout the territory of former
Roman Dacia and surrounding areas. These formations were known as knezdoms,
voivodeships and dukedoms, commonly termed by the people as “ţări” (terrae) = lands,
countries, i.e. Ţara Brodnicilor, Ţara Bolohovenilor, Ţara Sepeniţului.

The first state formation of
Romanians, the voievodeship of Transylvania, reached a relatively high level of
political and military organisation, putting up a long resistance to the
military pressure of the Hungarians between the 9th – 11th
centuries. In spite of this, Transylvania had to initially accept the Hungarian
leadership, and later, by the end of the 11th century and most of
the 12th century, to gradually fall under Hungarian domination,
although it preserved its own organisation until the fall of the Hungarian
Kingdom in the 16th century.

The changes that took place in
Europe in the 14th century, alongside the weakening of the more than
one-hundred-year-old Golden Horde, play a role in the appearance of two other
Romanian principalities in the territories that lie south and east of
Transylvania. The leading Romanian circles from Transylvania, then in conflict
with the Hungarian Crown because of the latter's intentions to dissolve the
local autonomies, urged and stimulated the process of unification of Romanians
from the lower southern and eastern lands.

As people kept crossing the
mountains, a new demographic inflow and further political experience were
brought to the south-and east-Carpathian leaders. In 1352-1353 Voivode Dragoş
from Maramureş (northern part of Transylvania) became the first appointed ruler
of the boundary province of Moldova. The economic exchanges, the development of
boroughs and of towns linked through transit trade routes with the commercial
world abroad, offered a good chance to the Romanian political formations to
place their unification projects on a viable basis. Once their independence
from the Hungarian Crown had been won in battle, two other Romanian
Principalities appeared – Wallachia in 1324, and Moldova in 1359.

The principality of Moldova
occupied a larger area stretching from the Black Sea and the Danube in the
south, to Galicia in the north, and from the Carpathian Mountains in the west
to the Nistru River in the east. Moldova had a glorious and legendary century
starting with the rule of Alexandru cel Bun (1400) and with the end of the rule
of Ştefan cel Mare (1504).

Many internal and foreign
documents from that century confirm the existence of a very tumultuous
political and cultural life in the principality of Moldova, which should be
regarded, to some extent, as an expression of the remote Renaissance in the
region. Some of the ceramic vestiges and coins from that period indicate that
the Latin language was still used in the Moldovan chancery.

Ştefan cel Mare (Stephen the
Great or the “Saint” whowascanonized in 1992) ruled Moldova between
1457-1504 and won European renown for his long resistance to the Ottoman
Empire. Never before was Moldova so expanded and so highly respected as it was
during Stephen the Great’s rule. A remarkable army commander and politician, he
sought to strengthen princely authority, to organize and bring about prosperity
for Moldova, and to fight for its independence against foreign invasions.
Though it was marked by continual strife, Stephen’s long rule nonetheless
brought considerable cultural development, and was a period of great
ecclesiastical building and endowment. As the legend has it, he ruled for 47
years and led 47 battles, mainly against the Turks.He built, rebuilt or patronized about the
same number of fortresses, churches and monasteries, which won him the acclaim
of Pope Sixtus IV as the “Athlete of Christ”. Eventually (in 1503, when he
concluded a treaty with sultan Bayezid), he managed to preserve Moldova’s
independence, but only at the cost of an annual tribute to the Turks.

Soon after Ştefan cel Mare’s
death, Moldova, following Wallachia, was obliged to submit to the Ottoman
Empire's control through Charters called “Capitulaţii” (Capitulations). Under
such capitulations the Romanian Principalities preserved their state entity,
their own political, military and administrative structures, laws and social
organization, thus avoiding a massive settlement of Muslims on their
territories, and preserving Christianity in the region.

After the battle of Mohacs
(Hungary) in 1526, and the fall of the Hungarian Kingdom, Transylvania became
an autonomous principality under Ottoman suzerainty, its political regime being
similar to that of Moldova and Wallachia. This status would account for
enhanced economic and political relations among the Romanian Principalities,
which were also favoured by the unity of language and, in a certain
geographical area, by the common tradition and historical heritage.

The heaviest burden of Ottoman
suzerainty was not political, but economic. At the end of the 16th century,
the tribute was raised steadily and demands for goods of all kinds, i.e. sheep,
grain, and lumber supplied at a very low price, had no limits; Constantinople
had become dependent on supplies from the Romanian principalities. Such a
status, imposed for three and a half centuries, prevented Moldova from extending
and developing strong ties with its western neighbours, to follow the
political, cultural and economical evolution of the Western Europe, and so to
become constituent parts of the developed, democratic Europe.

An important stage in the
history of the Romanians was marked by the sway of Mihai Viteazul (Michael the
Brave), the prince of Wallachia between 1593-1601. Mihai Viteazul joined the
Christian League, an anti-Ottoman coalition initiated by the Papacy and the
Holy Roman Empire (Austria, Mantua, Ferrara, Spain), and won the battles of
Călugăreni and Giurgiu against the Turks (1595), to regain the independence of
his country. In 1600, he was the first who for a short while ruled and controlled
the three Romanian lands – Transylvania, Wallachia, and Moldova. But the great
powers – Austria, the Ottoman Empire, and Poland – did not favour such a
policy, so that the union was short-lived. However, the idea of unification,
embraced earlier by Russians, was kept alive and gave fresh impetus to the
Romanians’ struggle for the setting up of an independent national state.

A relatively prosperous period
for the principality of Moldova during the Ottoman suzerainty was during the
years of the rule of Vasile Lupu (1634-1653). Vasile Lupu succeeded to not only
strengthen and modernize the state and local administration, but also to
develop an educational system and stimulate the genuine cultural flowering of
Moldova. Among significant reforms and achievements of that period are:
erection of the unique church in Iaşi “Trei Ierarhi” (1639), opening of the
first university in Moldova – Academia Vasiliana (1640), publishing the first
printed monument of the Romanian language (“Romanian Book of Teaching for
Sundays and Other Holidays”, 1643), adoption in 1646 of the first Moldovan code
of law (“Pravila lui Vasile Lupu”) etc.

Actually, from a cultural point
of view, the 17th and the first half of the 18th centuries
represent a period of “Great Moldovan chroniclers,” which formed the basis of
the Romanian literature and historiography. Among them Grigore Ureche
(1590-1647) with his “Letopiseţul Ţării Moldovei” (“Chronicle of the Land of
Moldova”), andMiron Costin (1633-1691)
with his “De neamul moldovenilor” (“On the Origin of the Moldovans”) had
articulately and persuasively argued, for the first time in Romanian
historiography, the Roman beginnings and Latin origin of the people of Moldova.
The language and historical proofs we see in the chronicle “O seamă de cuvinte”
(“Some words”) of Ion Neculce (1672-1745) certifies the genuine cultural
development in Moldova of that period. Later, Dimitrie Cantemir (1673-1723),
the ruler of Moldova between 1710-1711, succeeded to summarise and formulate in
some of his fundamental works, written in Latin, Romanian or Turkish and translated
in several European languages, the most important facts and aspects of
Moldova’s history, geography, ethnography etc.

The end of 17th and
the whole 18th century witnessed the decline of the Ottoman Empire
and the rise of the Russian and Austrian ones. The Eastern question came to the
core of European diplomatic debates. At that time the Romanian principalities
experienced a period of political decline because of the enlarged foreign
powers' involvement. Thus, in the wake of the Karlowitz Peace (1699),
Transylvania fell under Austrian rule. Nevertheless, the province remained an
autonomous principality. Meanwhile, in their organized expansion, the Russian
armies appeared in Moldova in 1711, led personally by Peter the Great. Prince
Dimitrie Cantemir and Peter the Great concluded the Lutsk alliance treaty
against the Turks with Russia, recognizing fully the sovereignty of Moldova and
her territorial integrity.But the
Russian defeat at the hands of the Turks in 1711 proved disastrous for
Moldova.From then until 1821, the Turks
replaced the Romanian Princes in both principalities with Greek administrators
from the Istanbul Phanar district.

Notable economic and social
changes took place in the 18th century and in the early 19th
century. Same as everywhere else in Europe, the national idea began to take
shape, lying at the foundation of the future plans of the Romanian politicians.
The union of a part of the Orthodox clergy in Transylvania with the Catholic
Church (Greek-Catholics), achieved between 1699 and 1701, played an important
part in the process of emancipation of the Romanians in Transylvania. Their
struggle for rights equal with the three other nationalities (although they
represented over 70% of Transylvania’s population), was initiated by bishop
Inochentie Micu-Klein, and continued by the intellectuals grouped in the
Transylvanian School movement.This contributed substantially to exploring and
enriching the Romanian history, culture and literature, and played an
extraordinary role in the cultural and political “new renaissance” of all
Romanians.

Modern times: Bessarabia. Romania

With the help of the Phanariot
princes and dragomans (i.e. foreign ministers), who were actually high Turkish
officials, the Empire hoped to preserve its control over Moldova and Wallachia.
At the same time, the Ottoman political and economic supervision increased, and
so did corruption. Notwithstanding its own decisions, the Ottoman Empire
started using the Romanian territories as if they were its own imperial possessions,
while also negotiating peace with its two rival neighbours -- the Habsburg
Empire and the Tzarist Empire.

Thus, at the Passarowitz Peace
talks (1718), the Turks ceded Oltenia, a region of Wallachia, to the Habsburg
Empire, which held it until the conclusion of the Belgrade Peace (1739). In
1775, the Habsburgs received another similar “donation” from the Turks, this
time the northern part of Moldova -- Bucovina. Bordering with the Tzarist
Empire since 1792 when Russia acquired the territory known today as
Transnistria, and extending its borders to the west along the river Nistru
(Dnester in Russian), the Ottoman Empire was permanently threatened to lose
control over Moldova. Since Russia didn’t want to wait too long for the right
moment, in 1812 the Ottoman Empire “ceded” her the eastern half of the
Principality of Moldova as a result of the Russo-Turkish war of 1806-1812.

At the time of its annexation
by Russia, the eastern half of Moldova between Prut and Nistru did not have a
name.In many ways its central part had
become the core of Moldova.The Russians
gave the name Bessarabia to the entire region, which before that was defined
only to the southern part of the interfluves area along the Black Sea.It was actually a shrewd diplomatic move to
circumvent the Tilsit Treaty (1807), which committed Russia to evacuate both
Wallachia and Moldova. Since the Treaty did not mention “Bessarabia,” the
Russian troops could remain there. In 1812, the Russians argued that Bessarabia
was still different from Moldova and it was in their interest to extend that
name to the whole territory between the Prut and the Nistru rivers. The Turks
who signed the Treaty were not aware of how far the region extended either.

The annexation of Bessarabia
had a dramatic impact over the destiny of Romanian Moldovans from this province
which, since 1812, with some short interruption, remained under Russia’s
discretion until the end of communism. The annexed province had an area of
46,000 square kilometres and approximately 480,000 people, of whom 90 percent
were Romanians.In the beginning
Bessarabia was an autonomous province, but in 1829 when her autonomy was ended
it became a simple Russian Gubernia. Life began to deteriorate immediately and
thousands of Romanians, nobles and peasants alike, crossed the Prut into what
remained of Moldova, preferring to live under Turkish suzerainty.

The Russian management of
Bessarabia was a disaster. The land remainedunderdeveloped and the people, the native Romanians in particular, remainedoverwhelmingly illiterate. Bessarabia had
the highest mortality rate in Europe, 50 percent higher than the Russian
average.The Romanian language was
gradually eliminated from schools, administration and even churches.
Almostall the towns of Bessarabia had a
massive settlement of Russians who controlled the local authorities and
industry, and the Romanian Moldovans became a source of unqualified workers for
the emerging regional Russian market. They remained aloofandcouldnot integrate into the new
Russian administration.

Meanwhile, although the Turkish
suzerainty persisted in the rest of Moldova and Wallachia well into the 19th
century despite unsuccessful revolutions in 1821 and 1848, the cultural and
political life in both Moldova and Wallachia was gradually influenced by
Western European countries, especially France. Indeed, after Russia was
defeated in the Crimean War (1853-1856), this called into question again the
fragile European balance. Owing to their strategic position at the mouth of the
Danube, as this waterway was becoming increasingly important to European
communications, the status of the Danube principalities became a European issue
at the peace Congress in Paris (February-March 1856). The seven powers that
signed the Paris peace treaty placed Moldova and Wallachia under their
collective guarantee. These powers decided then that:

·local assemblies
be convened to decide on the future organisation of the two principalities;

·the retrocession
to Moldova of Southern Bessarabia, which had been annexed in 1812 by Russia
(the Cahul, Bolgrad and Ismail counties);

·freedom of
sailing on the Danube;

·the establishment
of the European Commission of the Danube;

·the neutral
status of the Black Sea.

The support received from the
European powers encouraged cultural and political elites from dismembered
Moldova and from Wallachia to launch a new wave of unification, formed mostly
by individuals educated in the western universities, All social categories
participated in electing the two Ad-hoc Assemblies, which met in Iaşi and
Bucharest in 1857, and unanimously voted similar resolutions claiming the Union
of Moldova and Wallachia under a foreign prince selected from a ruling family
of Europe. French emperor Napoleon III supported this, but the Ottoman Empire
and Austria were against it, so a new conference of the seven protector powers
– Great Britain, France, Austria, Prussia, Russia, Turkey, and the Kingdom of
Sardinia – was called in Paris (May-August 1858).

Consequently, under the Paris Convention
of 1858, the respective powers decided that a Romanian ruler be elected for
each principality, the country being called henceforth the United
Principalities of Moldova and Wallachia. Each had its own parliament, one in
Bucharest and one in Iasi, and a joint Court of Cassation at Focşani. However,
the Romanian politicians did not wait for this resolution to be implemented but
acted on their own, confronting Europe with a fait accompli. Thus, on January
5/17, 1859 in Moldova and on January 24/February 5, 1859 in Wallachia they
elected colonel Alexandru Ioan Cuza as their unique prince, achieving de facto
the union of the two principalities. A new national state was created, which
took the name România in 1862 and settled its capital in Bucharest.

The new name was adopted
because most people inhabiting the lands called themselves “Români”
(Romanians). The new state, which included also the Southern Bessarabia with
Cahul County that belongs now to the Republic of Moldova, thus became the only
legal successor of the former two principalities. The country was not
officially recognized immediately, but its existence changed the balance in
Eastern Europe.Romania exercised a
great deal of influence over the Romanians left outside, and confronted Russia
with a new situation. It can be said that the formation of modern Romania was
instrumental in stopping Russia in her drive toward the Balkans.

Assisted by Mihail
Kogalniceanu, his closest adviser, Alexandru Ioan Cuza initiated a reform
programme, which contributed to the modernisation of the Romanian society and
state structures. This program included the law to secularise monastery assets
(1863), the land reform, providing for the liberation of the peasants from the
burden of feudal duties and the granting of land to them (1864), the Penal Code
law, the Civilian Code law (1864), the education law, under which primary
school became tuition free and compulsory (1864), the establishment of
universities in Iaşi (1860) and Bucharest (1864) and so on.

But in 1866 the reform-minded
Cuza was forced to abdicate and the Prussian Prince Carol of
Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen was appointed ruling prince of Romania on May 10,
1866, as a result of a plebiscite. The New Constitution passed in 1866 (and
remaining in force until 1923) proclaimed Romania a constitutional monarchy.

In 1877, at the beginning of
the 1877-78 Russian-Turkish War, Romania declared its independence from the
Ottoman Empire, and fought beside Russia in that war. The war brought not only
the independence of Romania, but after the war, in 1878, Russia re-annexed the
southern part of the territory between Prut and Nistru Rivers, while the
Bulgarian region Dobrogea became part of Romania. Thus, the whole of
Bessarabia, a region predominantly populated by ethnic Romanians, remained
under the Russian Empire control until the end of 1917.

Throughout the 19th century,
the events in the western half of the old principality moved in a very
different direction from those in Bessarabia. A century of harsh Russian rule prevented
all of Bessarabia from becoming a constituent part of the modern democratic
Romania. In Bessarabia, Romanian Moldovans were under a ferocious process of
Russianisation, with very low literacy, and in a continuing decrease of their
influence among the total population of Bessarabia (from 86% in 1817 to 47.6%
in 1897).In the western part of Moldova
the Romanian Moldovans contributed substantially in creating a new modern state
of Romania, in the founding of Romanian classical literature, and in establishing
a new and remarkable elite of political leaders, scientists, economists.

In 1910, before the 1st World
War, A. N. Kuropatkin, a Russian General, former Minister of War and a renowned
military writer, wrote that the Romanian population of Bessarabia still lived
in isolation and aloof from Russians. He added that in the future, be it by
peaceful means or following another war, the unification of the Romanian people
would be inevitable. The time of unification came only a few years later and
the First World War hastened it.

Union of Bessarabia with Romania

After Romania entered World War
I (1916) on the side of the Triple Entente (Britain, France and Russia), the
Romanian soldiers from Bessarabia, Romania and Transylvania (still under
Austria-Hungarian Empire) were forced to fight on different sides. Since the
war scene encompassed their native lands, this encouraged them to look for a
common post-war future.

Thus, in 1917, the Romanian
soldiers and prisoners from the eastern front (natives from Bessarabia, the
Kingdom of Romania, and Transylvania), together with legal representatives of
workers, peasants, teachers and clerics from whole Bessarabia, initiated and
organized the State Council (Sfatul Ţării) of Bessarabia, OnDecember 2, 1917 the Council declared
Bessarabia an autonomous republic, and soon, on January 24, 1918 it proclaimed
the independence of the Moldavian Democratic Republic (Bessarabia) and its
separation from Russia.

Confronted with threats of
isolation or absorption by the Ukraine, and in order to prevent the atrocities
of the Russian soldiers withdrawn from the Romanian-Galician front, and the
chaos prevailing in Russia after the Bolshevik revolution, the Sfatul Ţării
called in the Romanian troops.Soon
after, on March 27, 1918, the Bessarabian council voted to reunite Bessarabia
with Romania. During the same year, with the defeat of Austria-Hungary, the
unification with Romania of three other Romanian territories – Banat,
Transylvania and Bucovina – was finally achieved.

At the Paris Peace Conference
on March 9, 1920, the three great western powers – the United Kingdom, France
and Italy – consented to the reunion of Bessarabia with Romania,
re-establishing the new boundary along the Nistru River as it had been prior to
the annexation of 1812. The most important measures taken by the Romanian
authorities after the reunion were land reform, building of elementary
free-of-charge schools in all localities of Bessarabia, and creating conditions
for the Romanian language to became the language of all inhabitants of the
region. These reforms, along with the introduction of universal suffrage and
the passing of a new constitution, one of the most democratic on the Continent,
created a general-democratic framework and allowed for fast economic growth in
Romania (e.g. the industrial production doubled between 1923-1938).

In such a new political,
cultural and economic environment, the local population could recover its own
native language and the national identity altered during a ferocious century of
Russian domination in Bessarabia.For
the first time since 1812 all ethnic minorities could use their own mother
tongues in local schools and communities and communicate with the majority of
the population and state authorities in Romanian.

Meanwhile, the new Soviet
government, aggressively opposing the union of Bessarabia with Romania, took
various steps to acquire what it considered were “lost territories”. In 1924 a
Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (MASSR) was established within
the Ukrainian SSR on the border of Romania, in the territory known as
Transnistria, of which about a third of the population were Moldovans/Romanians
at the time. The town of Balta was its designated capital until 1929, when the
capital was transferred to Tiraspol.

Located on the eastern, or
“left”, bank of the Nistru River, the MASSR was meant to serve as a bridgehead
for Soviet influence in the interfluves and, in the greatest possible hopes of
the Soviets at the time, a paving of the way towards prospective
“sovietization” of the entire Romanian kingdom. This “Bessarabia in miniature”
provided Soviet policymakers and cultural planners with a diabolic laboratory.
Indeed, the notion that Romanians and Moldovans in Bessarabia and the MSSR
formed two separate ethno national groups, speaking different languages and
possessing separate historical, cultural, and even biological traits, became a
standard element of Soviet discourse on the Bessarabian question and the
central justification for Moscow’s territorial claims. In a sense, the MASSR
represented a first Stalinist step towards the “liberation” of the “Moldovan
nation”.

Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic

The opportunity for the Soviets
to “liberate” Bessarabia came in 1940. In August 1939, under the terms of the
secret protocols to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Germany declared its “lack of
interest” with respect to Finland, Estonia, Latvia, eastern Poland and
Bessarabia. Less than a year later, although Romania declared its neutrality in
September 1939, the USSR managed to force the Romanian government into
conceding Bessarabia and northern Bucovina. Soviet forces occupied these
regions in June 1940 within a matter of a few days.

At first the Soviet authorities
continued to call the occupied interfluves area “Bessarabia”, but soon
afterward the Soviet leadership proceeded to dismember the occupied
territories. Thus, on August 2, 1940, the “Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic”
was “proclaimed” by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, and the former “Moldavian
ASSR” was abolished. Northern Bucovina, northern and southern Bessarabia, and
an important part of the Moldavian ASSR were included into the “Ukrainian SSR”,
while 6 of 14 former districts of the Moldavian ASSR, and 6 of 9 Bessarabian
districts entered the Moldavian SSR. The inclusion of Bessarabia’s Danube and
Black Sea frontage into the Ukrainian SSR placed these strategic assets in the
hands of a reliable Soviet republic rather than leaving them under the control
of a newly created entity, not to mention a probable object of Romanian
aspiration towards re-unification with its dismembered territory.

It is noteworthy to mention
that such a decision did not correspond even to the provisions of the then
USSR’s Constitution, which stipulated that the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet
Union could only accept new soviet republics into USSR, not to proclaim/form
them or to establish their boundaries. Actually, the Moldavian SSR was the sole
soviet republic without any legal status within USSR.

Thus, it was the Moscow’s
arbitrary decision to include in the Moldavian SSR the central part of
Bessarabia (approximately two-thirds of that historical region), as well as a
thin strip of Transnistria lying along Nistru River and bordered to the east by
the Ukraine. The boundaries drawn by Moscow for MSSR in 1940 happened to be the
boundaries in which, in 1991, the Republic of Moldova was proclaimed and
recognised by the international community as an independent country.

Between 1941 and 1944 the
entire territory of Bessarabia, as well as northern Bucovina again became parts
of Romania, but in 1944 Soviet troops retook these territories. Finally, they
remained parts of the USSR until the disintegration of the Soviet empire in
1991, when the independent republics of Moldova and of the Ukraine where
established.

As the only republic in the
union whose titular nationality was represented by a sovereign state outside
the USSR (Romania), the MSSR represented a special case in Moscow’s economic
and cadre policies. After the re-occupation of Bessarabia and northern Bucovina
in 1944, the Soviet Union continued the colonial Tsarist policy of genocide
implemented by means of mass deportation, organized famine (provoked by
Communists grain requisitioning in 1946-47), forced nationalization and
collectivisation. The leadership of the USSR tried its very best, using
different methods by now infamous, to change the very ethnic structure of the
occupied Romanian territories in an overall two-pronged approach: the
diminution of the Romanian element, and the maximisation of the ethnic Slav
element. The following statistical figures illustrate this policy:

Ethnic structure of population

Bessarabia,under Tsarist Russia

MoldavianSSR,under Soviet regime

In 1817

In 1897

In 1959

In 1989

Romanians/Moldovans

86%

47%

65.4%

64.5%

Ukrainians

6.5%

19.9%

14.6%

13.8%

Russians

1.5%

8.0%

10.2%

13.0%

Others

6.0%

25.1%

9.8%

8.7%

Immediately after Bessarabia’s
occupation, the Soviet regime concentrated on the creation of a distinctly
“Moldovan” language and culture. Soviet cultural policy in Moldavian SSR was
designed to sever any historical, cultural or linguistic links between
Romanians and “Moldovans”, and to posit the existence of a distinct “Moldovan”
cultural heritage. Thus, the Russian script replaced the Latin script; Soviet
scholars declared “Moldovan” and Romanian to be separate languages within the
same east-Romance language family; while all the “literary critics and
historians” stressed the historical connections and traditions shared by
Moldovans, Russians and Ukrainians. The Communist Party and cadres from
Transnistria, controlled and supervised by KGB, played a leadership role in the
implementation of this project.

In a strangely repetitive historical
legacy, as Transnistria did at the time, it actually continues to have even now
a crucial influence on the destiny of the Republic of Moldova. Although
accounting for only an eighth of the Republic of Moldova’s land and population,
it played a dominant role in the republic’s economy and political system.
Moldova’s industrial enterprises were concentrated in Transnistria, in part
because of the surety of future Romanian demands over Bessarabia. Skilled
workers and even unqualified persons from other parts of the Soviet Union were
relocated there en masse, as well as in the whole of the MSSR. The region’s
temperate climate, rich in fruits, vegetables, and wine, also attracted many
other individuals, especially retired members of the Communist party and Soviet
Army. Since Transnistria had been part of the Soviet Union from as far back as
1917, cadres with family and professional ties to the region were seen as more
politically reliable than their counterparts from Bessarabia, which had been a
province of “bourgeois Romania” between the wars. In such circumstances, cadres
from Transnistria controlled predominantly all state structures.

The difficulties which faced
the native population from the Moldavian SSR were aggravated by some other
specific particularities of this Soviet republic. Indeed, in comparison with
the Baltic republics (Lithuania, Latvia or Estonia), the Moldavian SSR remained
after 1949 without its own native (Bessarabian) elite or intellectuals. Almost
all intellectuals from Bessarabia (public clerks, owners, managers, members of
non-leftist political parties, teachers, doctors, priests, students, etc.) were
deported to the remote Siberia or Kazakhstan’s areas (partially in 1940, and
massively in 1949), exterminated locally or sheltered to Romania or other
countries in 1944.

Moreover, Moscow resorted to
further dispersion of Moldovans through enforcement of policies assigning young
graduates from Moldova’s colleges and universities to compulsory workplaces
scattered throughout the USSR, especially in Central Asia, the Urals, and the
Far Eastern territory. And, in contrast, the Russian white-collar workers and
simple workforce, or even non-qualified workers from other parts of the USSR,
were continuously transferred to Moldova. Accordingly, for about 20 years all
public life, economy, education and culture were dominated by non-Bessarabians,
usually people who didn’t speak Romanian (frequently Russians and Ukrainians)
and those Transnistrians who used an altered dialect of Moldovan/Romanian
language.

In such circumstances, with no
contacts in Romania until the Perestroika, and under a ferocious KGB’s
surveillance, led by the communist party structures totally controlled by
Kremlin, the Moldavian SSR was transformed into a region where Moscow could
easily implement any of its ideological and economical experiences, leaving the
native population without any chance to dream about union with Romania or
independency.

Despite these facts, at the end
of the 1970’s, especially after the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968)
and the adoption of the CSCE Helsinki Final Act (1975), there was a wave of
discreet national movement in Moldova. Writers’ circles and academic groups
launched it initially, but later it was supported by some of the small
dissident groups representing a different social stratum. Some of those
individuals had to suffer serious consequences for their views, including years
of prison sentences.Evidence of these
developments can be seen until now in the significant increase of Moldovans
with typical Romanian given names among all Moldovan strata, and the appearance
of numerous literary works written in a genuine Romanian language, etc.

After Gorbachev started
Perestroika, the long dormant grievances which smouldered among a grassroots
element from all levels of Moldovan society motivated the appearance, in 1987,
of a democratic mass movement. In 1988 this movement transformed itself into
the Popular Front of Moldova, which grew rapidly into a real national movement
for liberation in the MSSR. The issues of ethnicity and language became key to
the political concerns of this movement, and these positions were indeed supported
by a large part of Moldovan society at the time. In August 1989, the Supreme
Soviet was forced to accept the demand of the Popular Front and adopted the law
requiring that the “Moldovan” (Romanian) language be written in Latin
characters, and that this be the state language of the republic. Local
officials to the area east of the Nistru River however, refused to enact the
language law in the area administrated by them where large numbers of Slavs
resided. A similar reaction was also met in the southern part of Moldova where
the Gagauz minority resided. In Chişinau, a political group, “Yedinstvo”
(“Unity”),was formed supporting
Transnistrian leaders and promoting the idea of Moldova’s continued inclusion
in the USSR.

Under the control of the KGB,
and with crucial support from Moscow itself, including military support (the 14th
Soviet Army headquarters were and are located in Transnistria), separatist
movements were quickly organised in the southern and eastern portions of the
country. Thus, on September 2, 1990 the “second extraordinary congress of
deputies” from Transnistria “proclaimed” a self-styled “Moldavian Transnistrian
Soviet Socialist Republic”. This was preceded by another “proclamation” from
the southeast (August 19), that of the apparently autonomy aspiring people in
the newly so-called “Gagauz Soviet Socialist Republic”. Since then the legal
authorities of Moldova don’t control the border with the Ukraine crossing
Transnistria, while the separatist authorities continue to govern this region
with considerable, if not indeed crucial, economic and military support from
Russia.

Republic of Moldova

The situation unexpectedly
changed in favour of the legitimate Chişinău authorities in August 1991, after
the failure of the soviet hard-liners military putsch in Moscow that year.The Moldovan Parliament (acting in a similar
fashion to the newly legitimate legislative bodies in other soviet republics
which had been occupied by the now rapidly disintegrating USSR), took the
opportunity to declare the independence
of the Republic of Moldova on August 27, 1991. The Transnistrian separatist
leadership, only a few days earlier, made its own declaration -- the
independence of “the Moldovan Transnistrian Republic” from Moldova.

Mircea Snegur, the first
president of the newly independent state, and his supporters in Parliament –
mainly managers of collective farms, and communist and soviet leaders from the
whole territory of Moldova -- became anxious because of the successive waves of
democratic transformations, as well as by the emerging separatist
movements.He refused to follow the
Baltic countries otherwise normal path towards a genuine independence. So it
was that in December 1991, President Snegur found himself signing a declaration
in favour of Moldova’s adherence to the newly created “Commonwealth of
Independent States (CIS)”, a successor state of sorts to the now decidedly
buried Soviet Union.By joining the CIS,
however, Moldova didn’t manage to solve many of its problems. The issue of
ethnicity and territoriality further degenerated into a dramatic confrontation
between the pro-western and legitimate Chişinău government, and the pro-Moscow,
and illegitimate Tiraspol government.

This soon led to armed
conflict, and in the spring of 1992, after Moldova became a member of the
United Nations (UN), Moldovan President Mircea Snegur (president from 1990 to
1996) authorized concerted military action against rebel forces which had been
attacking loyal Moldovan police outposts on the left bank of the Nistru, and on
a certain smaller section of the right bank in the southern city of Tighina
(Bender). The rebels, aided by contingents of Russian Cossacks and the Russian
14th Army, consolidated their control over most of the disputed
area, but by no means over all of it, as testified to by the heroic resistance
of loyal Moldovan police and volunteer forces in battles at Tighina and
Varniţa, at Cocieri-Dubăsari and Coşniţa-Doroţcaia plateaus. As a result of
this civil war, hundreds of people were killed, and thousands were forced to
leave Transnistria as refugees.

The Moldovan government made
several futile requests for UN intervention, buton July 21, 1992 was forced to settle for a
combined Russian-Transnistrian-Moldovan peacekeeping force. In May 1993 the
Moldovan side made several concessions to the opposing side, including the
allowance of Russian federal forces in eastern Moldova until the region was
granted some “special political status”. Still not satisfied despite their
considerable gains against the Chişinău government, and under the shadow of
soviet heavy artillery, the Transnistrian leadership even demanded that the
Moldovan Parliament rescind parts of its 1991 declaration of independence and
return the Republic of Moldova to a more subordinate political position within
the CIS.This they did not achieve.

In February 1994, Moldova held
its very first post-independence, free parliamentary elections. The
Communist-led Agrarian Democratic Party won the largest number of seats, and a
pro-Moscow, “old mind” bloc of Socialist parties won the next largest
percentage. Forming a large alliance, this majority immediately ratified
Moldova’s adherence to the CIS Economic Union. In order to block any attempt of
the opposition to claim a rapprochement between Moldova and Romania, President
Snegur, under the pressure of Agrarian-Socialist block, organized a hurried
referendum (March 1994), the main point of which was to underline “the peoples
will” to build an independent Moldova, entirely separate from Romania. Such a
measure, taken immediately after the elections (which otherwise reinforced the
influence of the old nomenclature when the electorate continued to be in a deep
depression provoked by the bloody and lost war in Transnistria, and by the
unprecedented post-independence inflation), brought the expected results to the
pro-Moscow faction.Around 90 percent of
those who participated in the pool supported a Republic of Moldova within its
1990 borders, entirely independent from Romania, but which would include the
Transnistrian region.

Soon after, the Moldovan
Parliament revoked the law which made the Moldovan national anthem identical to
the Romanian one, and then in April 1994 suspended the provision of the 1989
law that required the Romanian language to be known in ten years by all public
servants. Moreover, in July 1994, the newly adopted Constitution the Agrarian-Socialist
majority stipulated that the name of the official language of Moldova is not
Romanian but Moldovan, and proclaimed Moldova’s permanent neutrality (versus
NATO’s rapprochements of neighbouring countries).

The Agrarian-Socialist block
governance (1994-1998) had a dramatic impact on the Republic of Moldova’s
development as a newly independent country. Although Moldova was the first CIS
country to join the Council of Europe in 1995, and to implement the economic
reform with the support of international and regional organizations, the
“outcomes” of these reforms caused the country to be one of the poorest regions
in Europe.This was due to the fact
that, enjoying the support of the IMF, World Bank and donors who during these
years generously offered Moldova huge loans and grants totaling more than $1.3
billion, the Agrarian-Socialist government didn’t reform the agriculture, and
opposed massive privatisation.Instead
of this, the former communist leadership redirected budget sources and
different state-guaranteed loans and grants to non-reformed sectors of economy,
or used these financial sources totally improperly, thus actually contributing
to their embezzlement or stealing.

The Agrarian-Socialist
government aggravated Moldova’s poorest preparedness for a smooth transition to
market economics and democracy. Amid slow gains and painful setbacks to that
transition, without clear political views for the country’s future, Moldova
didn’t apply, as did other countries from the region, to become an aspirant to
NATO or the European Union membership. As a member of the Partnership for Peace
programme, its cooperation with NATO didn’t exceed the level of cooperation
attained by other aspirant countries. Moreover, during the years of 1994-1998,
Moldova did not take measures to be seriously and firmly supported by the U.S.,
European Union and other countries for pursuing the Russian Federation to
withdraw its troop and armaments from the Transnistria region where Russian
army troops prop up the breakaway authorities. They seized power by armed
insurrection in 1992, like a group of ex-KGB, and OMON (special forces)
officers arrived from Russia and the Baltic states (where they are wanted for
their role in murderous reprisal operations in 1991 in Latvia and Lithuania),
and continued to oversee Transnistria internal security services. Under such
circumstances, having Russia as a guarantor and mediator in settling the
conflict in the region, and the Russian “peacekeeping forces” and troops in
Transnistria, Moldova remained in a very vulnerable situation from military and
political points of view.

Accordingly, after the 1998
general elections when the Alliance for Democracy and Reform (ADR) took the
government, it was not capable of rapidly solving many of the existing painful
political problems.These included the
Transistrian issue, the huge Moldova external and internal debts inherited from
the Agrarian-Socialist government (especially those used for importing from
Russia the expensive energy resources), and the enormous arrears to pensions
and salaries.

Although the new pro-European
government clearly reoriented its foreign policy toward the West, and succeeded
in including the Transistrian issue on the agenda of OSCE and to strengthen
cooperation with the European Union, Moldova didn’t achieve the expected
results. The duplicity in its dialog with Moscow didn’t allow it to fully
benefit from the December 1999 OSCE summit decision regarding withdrawal of the
Russian troops and armaments from Transnistria by the end of 2002.

Corruption at all levels of
administration and justice, a huge and criminalized underground economy that
connected with the uncontrolled Transnistrian regime, a divided and differently
oriented political elite, all blocked ADR to convince the European Union to
grant Moldova an associated status. Moreover, before the December 1999 Helsinki
EU Summit, the plan incited and supported by President Lucinschi (elected in
1996) to dismiss the reformist ADR government and to split the ADR’s
parliamentary majority was achieved. As a result, the Communists (which
accounted for 40 out of 101 seats in Parliament) were brought again to the
front of the political scene.

This latest crisis developed
after many months of struggle between the president and parliament over
Lucinschi's attempts to enlarge his powers. As early as February 1999, after
parliament denied his proposal to extend his powers, Lucinschi turned to the
public for support, initiating a consultative referendum on May 23. The
plebiscite provoked only more confusion. Although 62 percent voted to accept
the proposal (36 percent rejected it), voter turnout was two points below the
60 percent required by the election law.

The Central Electoral
Commission, however, refused to declare the May 23 referendum invalid. Instead,
on June 1 the commission asked the Constitutional Court to decide whether voter
turnout was sufficient to validate the referendum. The Court refused to rule
until the commission had clearly stated its own view, and on June 5 the commission
declared—in a five to four vote—that the referendum was valid. Later, in
autumn, the Constitutional Court explained that a constitutional referendum
could be organized only by Parliament.

These long political disputes
and debates among parliamentary factions, and between the President and
Parliament, culminated with the modification of the Constitution of the
Republic of Moldova on June 5, 2000, when the Moldovan Parliament, with a large
majority, transformed Moldova into a parliamentary republic.According to the amended Constitution the
President of the Republic of Moldova shall be elected by Parliament, not by
popular vote, and the Government was invested with broader, extra powers.

The elections of the new
president of Moldova by the Parliament proved to be a difficult task for the
Parliament, which split into different antagonised groups. Although the
Communist Party leader Vladimir Voronin fell just two votes short of becoming
Moldova's third president in the first tour of elections, on December 21 the
right-centrists factions (Democratic Convention of Moldova, Democratic Party,
Party of Democratic Forces, and Christian Democratic Popular Party), candidate,
Pavel Barbalat, received only 35 votes, and boycotted the second round of a
repeated presidential election. Accordingly, after the Constitutional Court
concluded that all the conditions there allowed the President to dissolve the
Parliament, it was dissolved by President Lucinschi on December 30, 2000.

But the new preliminary
elections of February 25, 2001 happened to be a dramatic event for the Republic
of Moldova. Refusing to form an electoral bloc, almost all reformists,
pro-European political parties, and of course the incumbent President, Petru
Lucinschi, contributed to transform Moldova into the first post-Soviet country
in which the Communist Party legally came back to power. Only two other
political forces -- an ad-hoc pro-presidential political alliance led by the
incumbent prime-minister Dumitru Bragiş, and the Christian Democrat Popular
Party, supported indirectly by President Lucinschi, -- have passed the required
6% threshold, getting together 30 out of 101 seats in Parliament.

As expected, on April 2, 2001
the Communist controlled Parliament elected the Communist Party leader Vladimir
Voronin as Moldova's third president.With its own president and 71 seats in the legislature, the Party of
Communists now has more than sufficient power not only to change the
Constitution as it sees fit, but also to cardinally reorient Moldova’s future.
In this situation, the achievements and reforms made by the previous
government, and cooperation with IMF, World Bank, European Union and NATO, are
at risk. They could be partially or perhaps largely lost through further
destabilization of Moldova's internal politics, and a consequent leftward and
eastward shift in the complexion of its government.

The issue of Moldova’s
accession to the Russia-Belarus Union, and the possibility of holding a
referendum on that issue, arose after the Communist’s won the last elections.
The recent observer status, which was granted to the Moldovan Parliament at the
Russian-Belarus Parliamentary Assembly, indicatesa real threat for Moldova’s European
orientation.

The prospect of a political
settlement between Chişinău and Tiraspol seems more distant than ever after the
latest developments in the OSCE-mediated negotiations. The situation puts the
prestige of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe at risk, as
the deadline it has set for the withdrawal of Russian forces approaches without
a single Russian piece of combat hardware or ammunition trainload being
withdrawn.

On May 13, 2001, for the first
time ever, Transnistrian troops physically prevented a Moldovan head of state –
President Vladimir Voronin – from visiting territory controlled by the
secessionist authorities. Tiraspol, moreover, announced that Voronin must from
now on request permission from Transnistria's self-styled president Igor
Smirnov for any visit there. This incident was followed by the seizure of a
monastery and theological seminary on the right bank of the Nistru River by
left-bank Transnistrian troops under ex-KGB officers' command. As Vladimir
Socor, one of the most active authors on Moldova’s politics, recently wrote,
“this sort of event was probably not witnessed in Europe since Stalin's days,
yet it seemed to have passed without condemnation by any of the three
mediators”.

Moreover, Transnistria’s
leadership demanded for Chişinău to recognize that it committed military
aggression in 1992 against “the people of Transnistria,” to apologize for it,
and to pay compensation for damages. This clearly indicates that the
international community should react properly in order to find a feasible
solution for this conflict, taking into consideration that Tiraspol repeatedly
demanded (last time on May 16, 2001) that Chişinău should officially repudiate
the OSCE's 1999 decisions on the withdrawal of Russian forces from
Transnistria.

The latest agreement between
Chişinău and Tiraspol from May 16, 2001 regarding official recognition by
Chişinău of administrative and economic acts and documents of all types issued
by the “Transnistrian republic” was used by the Transnistrian leader Igor
Smirnov to issue a “decree”, according to which the soviet type passports
follow to be replaced with the Transnistrian ones starting with October 1,
2001. This way Smirnov underlines that Tiraspol (that is, Moscow) doesn’t want
at all to solve the conflict under international norms conditions.

The latest actions of the
Communist government and parliaments indicate that from this cornerstone, the
Republic of Moldova enters into a way that is difficult to oversee. Hopefully,
with the support of the international community, its own people and the
political elite, Moldova will nevertheless follow the path of democratisation
and integration into European structures.

The author of this survey is not a professional historian. Spending 11
years in the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova, including as chairman of
Foreign Policy Committee and Head of Moldovan delegation to the Parliamentary
Assembly of the Council of Europe, he noticed a big lack of updated historical
surveys/overviews about the Republic of Moldova, especially in the English
language, both in Moldova and in the West. The existing books or articles
written by foreign professionals unfortunately are not available for many of
those who are not historians but are interested or visiting Moldova, or do not
meet their time demands as busy or hurried people.

Actually, it is the second attempt of the author to help such
readers.On the eve of the war in
Transnistria in the spring of 1992, he published the handbook “The Republic of
Moldova” (in Romanian, English and Russian), which aimed to provide international
organizations, such as the Council of Europe, as well as simple readers from
Western countries, the genuine and updated facts about this new emerging state
and the separatist conflict in Transnistria. Now, when the author came back to
his previous activity and started working with English speaking people from
Western software companies, he decided to provide them, via the website of his
company, a direct, comprehensive and concise historical overview of the
Republic of Moldova.

In preparing this survey, the author used or interpreted several
paragraphs from the two most significant and relevant books about Moldova
edited in the U.S. by persons with whom the author had maintained useful and
productive contacts during the years:

“From Moldavia to Moldova. The Soviet-Romanian Territorial Dispute” by
Nicholas Dima(East European Monographs, Boulder Distributed by Columbia University
Press, New York, 1991).

Some paragraphs from this survey which reflect the recent developments
in Moldova are repeated opinions of well-known political analyst Vladimir
Socor, as stated in his latest articles published in The Jamestown Monitor
(Washington).The author maintains
useful and productive contacts with him during the post-communist years.

The author also consulted the
“Historical Dictionary of the Republic
of Moldova” by Andrei Brezianu(European
Historical Dictionaries, Nr.37. The Scarecrow Press, Inc., Lanham, Maryland,
and London, 2000), and the following websites:

If a Moldovan professional historian finally acts and writes a valuable
and convincing survey in English about the Republic of Moldova, the author will
accept with pleasure replacement of his work from this site.

If this survey motivates a person to go, read and reach different
conclusions from other sources, this presentation would have had a useful
purpose.